John Dickerson
Wednesday’s CBS This Morning gave another glowing segment to Swede and climate change teen Greta Thunberg, but as my colleague Scott Whitlock noted, they failed to include an embarrassing tidbit that, while the teen sailed on a zero emissions-boat across the Atlantic to New York for a United Nations conference, two individuals are being flown across the Atlantic to retrieve the boat.
Credit where it’s due: During Wednesday’s evening newscasts, CBS Evening News was the only network news program to report on the FBI’s expansive raids of current and former leaders of the United Auto Workers union. The corruption probe had been going on for four years and netted numerous convictions. Despite all of that, ABC’s World News Tonight and NBC Nightly News completely ignored the story.
As the saying goes, “all politics is local.” That sentiment seemed to seep into CBS News’s Thursday reports on New York Mayor Bill de Blasio throwing his hat into the 2020 race. In both flagship morning and evening newscasts, anchors and reporters alike mocked the Democratic candidate. During CBS This Morning, co-host John Dickerson quipped: “Bill de Blasio is the answer to what question that isn’t being [asked]?”
Wednesday morning the big three networks fretted over another comprehensive pro-life bill that was passed in the Alabama Senate last night, that would punish doctors who perform abortions or related activities during any stage of pregnancy for any reason other than saving the life of the mother. The bill’s Republican sponsor hopes to force the Supreme Court to revisit Roe v. Wade. Instead of interviewing pro-life organizations about the bill, all three networks hyped Democrat freak outs and nutty liberal activists dressed up as dystopian novel characters, instead.
It seems that in the eyes of NBC News, the evil Iranian regime can do no wrong even as all the evidence points to their involvement in the sabotage (via explosives) of four oil tankers in the Persian Gulf. Despite U.S. warnings over a week ago about such attacks from Iran or its proxies, Monday's NBC Nightly News projected skepticism with anchor Lester Holt calling the explosions “a mysterious so-called sabotage attack”.
The journalists at CBS This Morning scored an exclusive interview with former FBI Director James Comey. So what did they do with the time? They read back quotes from Comey to Comey. Though there was the occasional attempt at challenging the fired FBI director, the hosts often seemed impressed just to be talking to him.
CBS This Morning on Tuesday actually covered the heartbeat bill working its way through Georgia’s state house, deeming it a “controversial” and “restrictive” attempt at stopping abortion. This same network offered no coverage when New York state legalized late-term abortion (and certainly didn’t find the bill “controversial.”)
CBS This Morning on Monday again allowed Gayle King interview Cory Booker. King and the 2020 Democratic presidential candidate are personal friends and the co-host has been a supporter in the past. Booker jokingly worried he would get “tougher questions.” But instead, King simply wondered if his gun control plan could pass and if Booker will marry his actress girlfriend.
According to the New York Post’s Page Six and Variety, the CBS News is about to undergo some serious personnel changes. In addition to Bianna Golodryga’s previous departure, co-hosts John Dickerson and Norah O’Donnell have been booted from CBS This Morning for correspondent Tony Dokoupil and CBS This Morning: Saturday co-host Anthony Mason to team with Obama donor and family friend Gayle King.
Who better than hard-left partisan Adam Schiff to speculate on the Attorney General’s motives and Robert Mueller’s complaints about the summary of the Mueller report? CBS This Morning turned to Schiff on Wednesday as co-host John Dickerson wondered, “Do you think the Attorney General lied to Congress?”
During a contentious interview with Republican Utah Senator Mike Lee on Tuesday, the hosts of CBS This Morning grilled the lawmaker on whether President Trump should be impeached following the release of the Mueller report and fretted that the President was unfit for office. They also pressed Lee on whether the results of the Russia investigation would “hurt” Republicans politically.
Nothing controversial here. CBS This Morning co-hosts on Thursday breezily questioned 2020 presidential candidate Jay Inslee, offering little in the way of challenges to the Washington governor's plans to end the filibuster and the electoral college and to have Medicare for all. Instead, the journalists offered softballs with little skepticism.